The Press WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1968. Making Mines Safer

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31865, 18 December 1968, Page 18

The Press WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 18, 1968. Making Mines Safer

In his report on safety in New Zealand coalmines, Mr M. J. Ankeny has covered a highly technical subject in a way that is readily understandable by any layman who has the welfare of miners and the mining industry at heart. Everyone can appreciate the meaning and purpose of this report; yet some of Mr Ankeny’s criticisms, expressed, as they are, without extravagance or over-emphasis, are bound to invite rejoinders or excuses. When the Minister of Mines (Mr Shand) announced that he would engage an overseas authority to review mining conditions and practices this newspaper doubted the need to seek advice outside New Zealand, which is rich in mining experience and has produced outstanding mining engineers and managers. Mr Ankeny’s report clearly justifies his appointment, on one score particularly: he has inspected, interviewed, and inquired, drawn conclusions, and made recommendations in a wider perspective than might have been possible for a New Zealand expert. Mr Ankeny has reported only on what he believes to be in the interests of increased safety in the mines. He has expressly excluded the question of how much his proposals would cost For the most part the cost is not likely to be very great; and the circumstances in which the inquiry originated—the Strongman mine explosion in which 19 men died - are a guarantee that the cost will not be paramount when the proposals are considered. Few persons will deny the rightness of spending whatever is necessary to safeguard miners against such tragedies—or against lesser accidents. This thought, of course, does not settle the question of cost. A much broader, and more difficult, aspect of the question is whether men should be expected to work in potentially dangerous underground mines at all. Can any safeguards be sufficient? If mining were vital to the national economy even this problem might be settled without too much trouble. The most that can be said is that underground coalmining remains a useful industry and one on which the prosperity of some other industries still depends. But it would be wrong to make major investments in underground mines and to encourage men to prepare for a lifetime’s work in mining if, in a few years, coal was bound to be replaced by other fuels. Some of the recommendations should obviously be implemented without delay: others, such as the moving of coal by hydraulic methods, could only be considered within the framework of a national policy on the future of coalmining and one that might mean the closing of more mines. This policy must be prepared with due regard for the cost of producing coal, for the demand for coal, and for the need to mine it under the safest possible conditions. The report raises many practical matters which imply financial considerations; these in turn raise moral questions about the conditions under which hundreds of men are asked to work. The questions will not be solved merely by implementing Mr Ankeny’s recommendations.